David Swanson, author of Daybreak: Undoing the Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union, discusses the myth of Constitutionally-derived presidential supremacy in foreign affairs, why Congress prefers acting like an executive advisory committee instead of a co-equal branch of government, the Tenth Amendment’s losing battle against the Commerce Clause, progress in civil and foreign court cases against Bush administration crimes that Obama steadfastly ignores, the neglected subpoena and impeachment powers of Congress and the public pressure that is the driving force behind the “Audit the Fed” amendment.

MP3 here. (56:28)

David Swanson is Co-Founder of AfterDowningStreet.org, creator of ProsecuteBushCheney.org, Washington Director of Democrats.com and a board member of Progressive Democrats of America, the Backbone Campaign, Voters for Peace and the Liberty Tree Foundation for the Democratic Revolution. He was the press secretary for Dennis Kucinich’s 2004 presidential campaign, media coordinator for the International Labor Communications Association, and worked three years as communications coordinator for ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.

Nat Hentoff, senior fellow at the CATO Institute, discusses the greatly lessened restrictions on domestic FBI surveillance programs, the FBI’s “investigative assessments” that supplant judicial warrants and oversight, the failure of the educational system to teach the Constitution and limitations on government power and how colonial era rebellion against writs of assistance inspired the Fourth Amendment.

MP3 here. (22:18)

Nat Hentoff is one of the foremost authorities on the First Amendment. While his books and articles regularly defend the rights of Americans to think and speak freely, he also explores our freedoms under the rest of the Bill of Rights and the 14th Amendment by showing how Supreme Court and local legislative decisions affect the lives of ordinary Americans. Hentoff’s column, Sweet Land of Liberty, has been distributed by the United Feature Syndicate since 1992.

Hentoff has earned numerous awards and is a widely acknowledged defender of civil liberties. In 1980, he was awarded an American Bar Association Silver Gavel Award for his coverage of the law and criminal justice in his columns. In 1983, the American Library Association awarded him the Imroth Award for Intellectual Freedom. In 1995, he received the National Press Foundation Award for Distinguished Contributions to Journalism, and in 1999, he was a Pulitzer finalist for commentary.

Hentoff was a columnist and staff writer with The Village Voice for 51 years, from 1957 until 2008. A jazz expert, Hentoff writes on music for The Wall Street Journal and Jazz Times.     Hentoff has lectured at many colleges, universities, law schools, elementary, middle and high schools, and has taught courses in journalism and the Constitution at Princeton University and New York University. Mr. Hentoff serves on the Board of Advisors of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (F.I.R.E.) and is on the steering committee of the Reporters’ Committee for the Freedom of the Press. A native of Boston, he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in education and was a Fulbright Fellow at the Sorbonne in Paris in 1950. He did graduate work at Harvard University, received his B.A. with highest honors from Northeastern University and was awarded an honorary doctorate of law from Northeastern in 1985.

Anthony Gregory, research analyst at the Independent Institute, discusses the definition and history of habeas corpus, the unfortunate fact most Americans are either pro-Obama or pro-war, the Obama administration’s fight to deny habeas rights to Bagram prisoners and the continuing trend of presidents who embrace total executive authority.

MP3 here. (33:59)

Anthony Gregory is Editor-in-Chief at Campaign for Liberty and a Research Analyst at The Independent Institute. He earned his bachelor’s degree in American history from the University of California at Berkeley and gave the undergraduate history commencement speech in 2003. Mr. Gregory is also the recipient of the Ron Paul Liberty in Media Award for his Independent Institute article, “An Anniversary that We Must Never Forget.”

His articles have appeared in the San Diego Union-Tribune, East Valley Tribune (AZ), Contra Costa Times, The Star (Chicago, IL), Washington Times, Vacaville Reporter, Palo Verde Times, and other newspapers, and he regularly writes for numerous news and commentary web sites, including LewRockwell.com, Future of Freedom Foundation and Rational Review. Mr. Gregory is currently writing an Independent Institute book on individual liberty and the writ of habeas corpus.

Thomas E. Woods, author of Meltdown: A Free-Market Look at Why the Stock Market Collapsed, the Economy Tanked, and Government Bailouts Will Make Things Worse, discusses the debt some progressive causes owe to states’ rights, vintage 1812 war propaganda that sounds alarmingly like the run-up to the war in Iraq, state nullification of unconstitutional federal laws and the undue respect given to the Supremacy Clause.

MP3 here. (36:05)

Thomas E. Woods, Jr., is the New York Times bestselling author of nine books. A senior fellow at the Ludwig von Mises Institute, Woods holds a bachelor’s degree in history from Harvard and his master’s, M.Phil., and Ph.D. from Columbia University.

Glenn Greenwald, former constitutional lawyer and current Salon.com blogger, discusses Washington’s treatment of the Constitution as a legal suggestion, why real patriots are civil liberties extremists, evolving Democratic excuses for not prosecuting Bush administration war crimes and how governmental powers “temporarily” increased during emergencies never fully recede.

MP3 here. (38:45)

Glenn Greenwald was a constitutional lawyer in New York City, first at the Manhattan firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, and then at the litigation firm he founded, Greenwald, Christoph. Greenwald litigated numerous high-profile and significant constitutional cases in federal and state courts around the country, including multiple First Amendment challenges. He has a J.D. from New York University School of Law (1994) and a B.A. from George Washington University (1990). In October of 2005, Greenwald started a political and legal blog, Unclaimed Territory, which quickly became one of the most popular and highest-trafficked in the blogosphere.

Upon disclosure by the New York Times in December 2005 of President Bush’s warrantless eavesdropping program, Greenwald became one of the leading and most cited experts on that controversy. In early 2006, he broke a story on his blog regarding the NSA scandal that served as the basis for front-page articles in the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and other newspapers, all of which credited his blog for the story. Several months later, Sen. Russ Feingold read from one of Greenwald’s posts during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Feingold’s resolution to censure the president for violating FISA. In 2008, Sen. Chris Dodd read from Greenwald’s Salon blog during floor debate over FISA. Greenwald’s blog was also cited as one of the sources for the comprehensive report issued by Rep. John Conyers titled “The Constitution in Crisis.” In 2006, he won the Koufax Award for best new blog.

Greenwald is the author of A Tragic Legacy: How a Good vs. Evil Mentality Destroyed the Bush Presidency, How Would a Patriot Act? Defending American Values from a President Run Amok and Great American Hypocrites: Toppling the Big Myths of Republican Politics.

Bruce Fein, associate deputy attorney general under Ronald Reagan, discusses restoring the rule of law to the executive branch of government, the unprosecuted torture and FISA violations that are piling up, Obama’s impeachable neglect of his duty to faithfully execute the law and why a presidential pardon and not selectively ignoring the law is the way to deal with politically sensitive crimes.

MP3 here. (26:32)

Bruce Fein is a lawyer specializing in constitutional and international issues. He graduated from Harvard Law School with honors in 1972. After a coveted federal judicial clerkship, he joined the U.S. Department of Justice where he served as assistant director of the Office of Legal Policy, legal adviser to the assistant attorney general for antitrust, and the associate deputy attorney general.Mr. Fein then was appointed general counsel of the Federal Communications Commission, followed by an appointment as research director for the Joint Congressional Committee on Covert Arms Sales to Iran. He recently served on the American Bar Association’s Task Force on Presidential signing statements

Mr. Fein has been an adjunct scholar with the American Enterprise Institute, a resident scholar at the Heritage Foundation, a lecturer at the Bookings Institute, and an adjunct professor at George Washington University. He has also been executive editor of World Intelligence Review, a periodical devoted to national security and intelligence issues. He regularly lectures to foreign guests and dignitaries visiting the United States on behalf of the State Department.

Marjorie Cohn, president of the National Lawyers Guild, discusses the illegality of the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the use of torture to extract false confessions linking Saddam Hussein and al-Qaeda, the embarrassment of Spain investigating U.S. war crimes while Obama sidesteps the issue and Condi Rice’s comeuppance at Stanford.

MP3 here. (23:39)

Marjorie Cohn is president of the National Lawyers Guild and a professor at Thomas Jefferson School of Law. She is the author of Cowboy Republic: Six Ways the Bush Gang Has Defied the Law and Rules of Disengagement: The Politics and Honor of Military Dissent.

Noam Chomsky, author of Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, discusses the roots of U.S. imperialism, the often overlooked opportunity costs of empire, the exaggerated strength of U.S. economic rivals, the continuation of the Great Game into the 21st century, how the Western World’s observance of the Durand Line exacerbates problems in Afghanistan, the empire’s loss in Iraq, the U.S. doctrine of punishing Iran just to make an example out of them and the Israeli policy of incremental displacement of the Palestinian population in the occupied territories.

MP3 here. (41:12)

Noam Chomsky is professor emeritus of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and widely regarded as the father of modern linguistics. He is the author of Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy, Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies and dozens of other books on politics and linguistics.

The Other Scott Horton, international human rights lawyer and contributing editor at Harper’s magazine, discusses the Justice Department’s release of post-9/11 Bush administration legal opinion memos, the assertion of executive supremacy over the first and fourth amendments to the U.S. Constitution, the possible scope of unknown Bush legal shenanigans and why blue-ribbon investigative committees aren’t always bipartisan cover-ups.

MP3 here. (31:13)

The Other Scott Horton (no relation) is a New York attorney known for his work in emerging markets and international law, especially human rights law and the law of armed conflict. He lectures at Columbia Law School.

Glenn Greenwald, renowned Salon.com blogger, discusses the Obama administration’s impact on civil liberties, the failure of Obama’s government to reverse a single Bush-era legal position, how the Bagram prison in Afghanistan is replacing Guantanamo as the new extralegal detention facility, the spectacular claim that a global war on terror makes the whole world a battlefield and all its inhabitants potential enemy combatants, the history of the state secrets privilege from its original limited exemptions to the current claims of total immunity and why non-prosecuting truth and reconciliation committees should be reserved for third-world countries.

MP3 here. (45:28)

Glenn Greenwald is a former constitutional lawyer and author of Great American Hypocrites: Toppling the Big Myths of Republican Politics, A Tragic Legacy: How a Good vs. Evil Mentality Destroyed the Bush Presidency, and How Would a Patriot Act? Defending American Values From a President Run Amok. His blog and radio show can be found at Salon.com.